


Everything Is Nothing

by TheRebelDread



Category: Devil May Cry, DmC: Devil May Cry, One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Crossover, Dubious Consent, Explicit Language, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-03
Updated: 2013-02-03
Packaged: 2017-11-28 03:11:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/669619
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheRebelDread/pseuds/TheRebelDread
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dante closes one eye and squints down the barrel. His arm is still, his muscles loose. "There's a demon outside the window." He says a little too leisurely, his lips moving around the filter of the cigarette. "I'm debating whether I should put a bullet in its skull, or go out and take off its head."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Everything Is Nothing

**Author's Note:**

> Total crack pairing. But I became sort of obsessed with the idea ever since it was born in the dark caverns of my mind. Instead of trying to fit one fandom into the other and combine them into one crazy crack fic, I decided on a slightly darker AU. This is what I came up with.
> 
> Zayn is not famous. He is not in a boy band.
> 
> Inspired by early DmC concept art.
> 
> Title and lyrics from "Never Surrender" by Combichrist.

  
_“I will suffer, I will burn._   
_Let hate prevail._   
_Enslaved my soul, but I'll never surrender....”_   


  
It's the cold click of metal that wakes him. Like the sound of a gun barrel sliding into place. Zayn blinks slowly into consciousness, his are eyes so heavy. Through a haze of sleep, he sees Dante sitting at the edge of the bed; with only a thin sheet covering his lower half and a lit cigarette between his lips as he flips one of his guns lazily in his hand. _Ivory,_ he calls her. Zayn rubs at his eyes and furrows his brows.

"Dante," his voice is groggy, and his body aches to slip back under the warm covers. "What are you doing?"

Dante closes one eye and squints down the barrel. His arm is still, his muscles loose. "There's a demon outside the window." He says a little too leisurely, his lips moving around the filter of the cigarette. "I'm debating whether I should put a bullet in its skull, or go out and take off its head."

Zayn sits up slowly and follows his aim. It's dark in Dante's trailer. The only light comes from a busted street lamp and filters through the blinds. It's like looking through the green panel of a dirty stained glass window. Zayn's eyes squint as he peers through a gap in the blinds.

"Dante," his voice cracks, "There's nothing there."

Dante turns to look at him, and by the dark circles under his eyes, Zayn wonders just how long he's been awake. His eyes narrow gravely. "What the fuck are you talking about? Of course it's out there." His cigarette is burning low, and the street light flickers as he turns back to the window. "'s a Dreamrunner. But he can't touch me here....Why the hell isn't he dragging me into Limbo?.....He's just.... _staring."_ He's mumbling, speaking more to himself than anyone else.

Zayn feels a shiver crawl down his spine and shifts closer to Dante on the bed. He's wearing one of Dante's shirts; it's a little too big on him and he likes it that way. Likes the way the worn fabric feels against his skin and slips down over his collarbone.

"There's no demon, babe....Go back to sleep." He puts a gentle hand on Dante's shoulder. His skin is almost hot to the touch.

Dante ignores him, and ash from his cigarette drops onto the white sheet. "Something's not right......It's Vergil.."

Zayn's eyes widen at the name. _"Vergil?_ Dante....why are you talking about him?"

"They found him, I know it. They know about my brother. The demon son of a bitch is laughing at me. I'm gonna rip out its fucking throat." His voice booms throughout the tiny trailer, and Zayn swears he feels his temperature rise. He lunges forward, but Zayn pulls him back.

"Dante, stop! There's no demon!"

  
But Dante grabs Zayn's thin wrist and flips him easily on his back, and the teenager finds himself pinned to the mattress with a gun under his chin. Fear rushes through him. Dante's skin is hot, but his gaze is stone cold, bearing into Zayn like he can see straight through him.

"There's no demon?"

Zayn shakes his head. "No." He'd be ashamed of the way his voice squeaked, if all his senses weren't focused on fear. Dante's lips leave a sweet, feather light kiss on Zayn's ear, but his breath is stifling, and his words are poison. "He's inside now. Right behind me. I can feel him breathing down my neck....Can you feel it, Zayn? Can you feel him watching you?"

Zayn squeezes his eyes shut. He can't focus on anything but Dante's breath on his neck, and how his skin burns like it's on fire.

"He wants you. God I can _feel_ how bad he wants you...." Zayn feels the hard line of Dante's cock pressing against his thigh. He tries to ignore it. Tries to ignore the push of his hips and the tongue running over his throat. "But you're mine, and I won't let him take you. Won't let him fucking touch you."

"Dante...." it's meant to be a warning. To make him stop. _'Please, please don't do this Dante.....Please just let me help you..'_ But Zayn's body betrays him, and his hips arch into the contact. Because he can't help it, because Dante is everything and it feels like he needs him just to breathe. He hears Dante groan; low, predatory, possessive. _"Mine."_

Zayn's brain shuts down when Dante wraps his legs around his waist, and when he grinds his hips and hot friction rolls through him, he forgets about the gun. Zayn can feel Dante's lips move against his skin, but he can't make out what he's saying. Doesn't care, really, until he realizes he's muttering the same thing, over and over.

“Not like them....Not like them....” Then Zayn feels nails digging into his sides, harder and harder, until blood trickles down his ribcage. And then Dante's temper reignites like someone had doused it in gasoline and tossed in a match.

“I will rip him apart!”

He turns to aim the gun behind him, cocks it, and all at once Zayn is fighting him again. Struggling, straining, twisting, using every ounce of strength he has to try get the gun out of his hand. He has to try, God, he has to try. But it's useless, and it doesn't last long. Dante has him pinned down in less than a minute, and sweet Ivory pressed to his throat. He's hovering over him, panting, and the look in his eyes rattles Zayn to his core.

“Dante, stop! Please!”

“Shut up!” And Zayn does shut up. Because Ivory is between his eyes, and he has to look down the barrel to meet that icy stare. “Do you want them to take you? Because that's why they're here. They're not gonna stop until they've destroyed everything I love.” He lowers the gun, his eyes softening as he runs a gentle hand through Zayn's hair. “I won't let them do that to you. I won't let them destroy you like they destroyed my parents....Or rip your heart from your chest....I won't lose you, Zayn.”

He leaves the boy on the bed to pull on a pair of jeans, sliding Ivory and her sister Ebony into his belt. “That's why I have to find Vergil. I have to warn him. We have to stop this before-”

  
“Dante.”

Zayn's voice is so soft and timid that it makes every other sound in the room fade away. It's like a single drop of purity in a sea of depravity. When he turns to look at him, the boy's eyes are shrink-wrapped in tears. He watches one roll down his cheek, and feels as though he's witnessing some of that innocence slip away.

  
“Dante....” Zayn swallows hard around a lump in his throat, “Vergil's dead.”

  
For a moment, there's nothing but silence. The kind of quiet that makes your ears ring like you might forget how to hear again. The street lamp outside casts deep shadows over Dante's sharp features. He looks like he belongs to them. Was born in them.

“What.” It cuts through the silence like a hot knife through butter. It's not even a question, it's a statement, a _demand._ And although Dante's voice is relatively calm, the younger boy fears what he knows is coming.

  
“Your brother's dead, Dante. He's been dead for years.”

This time Ebony is at his temple, and Dante's sitting on his chest with his hand around his throat. It happens so fast that Zayn doesn't have time to inhale, and with Dante's weight crushing down on him, his lungs have no room to expand.

“You're a liar!” Dante spits, his eyes blazing, “You're a liar and I should put a bullet in your skull! You don't know my brother!”

  
Zayn sucks in as much air as his lungs will allow and forces it out in one breath. “Neither did you.”

  
An icy feeling prickles at the base of Dante's spine. He sits back, finally, _finally_ relieving the pressure on the boy's delicate ribcage, and Zayn reveals in the rush of air that fills his lungs. The gun is still pointed between his eyes, but Zayn's too busy trying to remember how to breathe.

“What does that mean?”

Zayn is still heaving, clutching at his chest because it feels like it's on fire. “Dante,” his voice is hoarse – God, are his ribs broken? “When's the last time you had-”

“I said _'what the fuck does that mean?'”_

  
His voice wavers, if only a little, as he jabs the gun between the boy's eyes. Zayn is scared, so scared. Because they've been through this before, but it's never been this bad. Not ever. He's shaking so bad. He closes his eyes for a moment and takes a deep breath. When he opens them, he looks past the gun, and straight at Dante.

“Your twin brother, Vergil, died in childbirth. You never knew him. When you were seven, your parents were murdered. Your father was shot, and your mother raped and stabbed. You survived because she hid you in the closet. You saw everything. When the police came, they found you holding your her body....You told them that demons killed your parents. Demons with red and blue faces....You were sent to live in an orphanage, but they said you were too violent. So you were institutionalized –“

“Shut up!” Dante's voice cracks, and the gun shakes. “You're lying! How could you possibly know any of that?”

Zayn reaches out to touch him, a simple gesture that he can only hope will soothe him. “You told me, Dante. When you were stable.”

But Dante quickly pulls his hand away. “What the fuck do you mean when I was _'stable?'”_

  
Zayn sighs. He's so tired. “You didn't let me finish....When you were institutionalized, the only thing that stopped you from screaming bloody murder every night, was this.” In his hand is a metal syringe, his palm red and raw from holding on to it so tightly. “It's medicine, Dante. It helps you. But when you don't take it, you get confused. You don't know what's real. I knew you must have missed a few doses. I was trying to give you some, but you wouldn't listen.”

Dante takes the vile from Zayn's hand, and feels as though he's holding something familiar and completely foreign at the same time.

“I was only trying to help.” Zayn's voice is broken. Almost childlike. “The men who killed your parents were just cowards. Cowards who wore masks....There are no demons, Dante.”

  
The silence returns. The gun is no longer in Dante's hand. “No demons?”

Zayn shakes his head. He looks so fragile.

  
_Zayn_....What the fuck was the kid's last name again? Fuck, why can't he remember anything? He remembers red.....Red like the demon masks. Red like his mother's blood on his hands....It was still warm.... His head is throbbing and he presses the heel of his hand between his eyes. He feels like he's splitting in two. Nothing is real and everything is nothing. He's drowning in a sea of chaos, but there is no water in an ocean that doesn't exist. There is a war in his head, and in the middle of all this fictitious carnage is Zayn. Zayn who is a warm body and a beating heart. And Dante wants to remember his last name.

  
He barely feels it when he plunges the needle into his thigh, but the dose hits him like a truck. He can feel it rushing upwards though his veins like it's consuming him. Becoming him. Or he's becoming something else. His body screams in panic. _What have you done?! You're killing us!_ It burns like fire in his veins, and when it reaches his heart, Dante swears it explodes. Then the darkness takes over.

 

  
_“Dante wake up! Please wake up!”_

Amid the darkness, something familiar stirs in Dante. He knows that voice. And the hands shaking him, he knows who they belong to. He opens his eyes. He remembers.

“Malik.” Zayn looks confused and relieved all at once, and Dante envies the innocence in his eyes. “Zayn Malik.” Then he smiles, and all the other white noise in Dante's head fades away.

No more demons. No more pain.

  
Sleep is already calling him. A warm, comfortable sleep free of nightmares. His eyes are heavy, and Zayn seems content to let them close. He settles against the warmth of the boy's chest, and listens as the hammering in his ear finally slows.

“You scared me, Dante.”

And Dante knows it all too well. But he doesn't apologize because words seem so insignificant. When he presses a kiss to Zayn's neck, the boy seems to understand.

“I want to help you.” But sleep is already taking him, and Zayn's words are nothing more than a warm breath that fades away like all the memories in red. “I'll call Dr. Mundus in the morning.”


End file.
